Nikon Instech, Nikon's affiliate company, announced today its release of a new portable 3D scanner "P3D NC-2323S" on June 1. The price will be around 3,800,000 yen.

P3D NC-2323S allows you to measure easily without using a PC. With the LCD touch-panel and simple graphical user interface, even a person who uses it for the first time can obtain 3D data of the object just by aiming it towards the object and pressing the shutter button.

Japan Airlines is going to start offering a special in-flight meal jointly developed with Kumamoto prefecture which is located in the southern island of Kyushu. The name of the in-flight meal is (of course) named after THAT famous bear character mascot, "Air Kumamon".

Honda announced that their old-school two‐wheeled motorbike, Super Cub, has obtained 3D trademark registration with the Japanese Patent Office. This is the first time in Japan that the shape of a vehicle is protected.

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Terrie’s Take is a selection of Japan-centric news collected and collated by long-time resident and media business professional Terrie Lloyd. AkihabaraNews is pleased to present Terrie’s learned perspective; we all could use another take on the news - here’s Terrie’s:

This week it’s Japanese researchers tacking orders of magnitude greater performance onto solid state computer memory (SSD), and Panasonic has gone public with its plans to be the sole battery provider for the awesomely sexy Tesla Motors’ electric automobiles...which, technically and unfortunately, still run on fossil fuels.